love enough to kill me (but i'm unsure of its worth)
by murphysarc
Summary: s5 finale, in which Izzie dies, George is never close to death's door, and the rest of the residents are left to pick up the pieces. Title from "Weeds or Wildflowers" by the Parsonfields, a song which I think fits Grey's strangely well. An Alex/Cristina/Meredith fic.
"Who's going to get him off the bed?"

Cristina's words pierce through the silence gathering around them. "I don't know," Meredith says after some seconds, though she's not sure if she said it out loud or not.

She's standing with Cristina, shoulder to shoulder, only inches from the door to the ICU room. Bailey and the Chief are right behind them, having come out from the room only recently. They don't know what to do, and neither does Meredith, but people keep coming to gather. George is there, and Callie, Arizona, Derek, Mark, Lexie, and Owen, and half a dozen nurses Meredith can't believe she still doesn't know the names of.

"But who is?" Cristina repeats.

Alex is inside the ICU room - Izzie's ICU room. He's on the bed, his arms curled around Izzie's body and his legs joined with her legs. His face is pressed into the crook of her arms, except they aren't her arms anymore, because they aren't holding him back. "What happened?" Meredith whispers, her eyes staring at Izzie's arms, her chest, her legs, but never her face. She can't look at Izzie's face, because it will look…it…it won't look alive. It won't look alive, and Meredith doesn't know how she'll be able to handle that.

Cristina doesn't answer her question. Meredith can't blame her.

Five minutes go by before Meredith can bring herself to make a move. Slowly and carefully, she steps into the room. She feels like she's walking in on a tightrope, and if she steps even a little bit off, she'll break. She'll break, just like Alex…oh, god, Alex…

"Alex?" she whispers. In response, he turns his head slightly away from her, moving just a little closer to Izzie.

"Alex," Meredith tries again. "Please, you can't…I can't…I'm not strong enough to lift you off of here, okay!"

There's some silence, and then, he turns himself back. His eyes are shut, and tears have dried on his cheeks. "I can't move," he whispers. His voice is hoarse but he hasn't been talking. "I don't think I can move."

"I know," she whispers, and she sees another tear come down his cheek, but then somehow he moves anyways. His fingers unclench their grip and his legs uncross from hers, and Meredith lets him support himself on her because his legs just won't support his weight. Cristina is somehow on his other side. Meredith's not sure when she got there, but she's grateful, because together they manage to haul Alex out of the room and away from prying eyes.

She still hasn't looked at Izzie's face.

\\\\-||-/

George leaves two days after Izzie's funeral.

He was all set to leave the day she died, but he held it off to say goodbye to her. He doesn't bother to say goodbye to them, though, not properly anyways. Meredith can't blame him though - if it was her, she wouldn't be able to, either. Still, it feels like another blow, almost worse than the funeral, because now five has sunk to three.

It's not even three, though, because Alex is a shell of a human being now. And they can't help him.

They can't do anything.

\\\\-||-/

 _"She's coding!"_

 _"I'm starting compressions!"_

 _"Alex, you can't…Alex, she signed a DNR!"_

 _"I'm not letting her die. I won't let her die! Someone, get a crash cart! Help me save her life!"_

 _But they can't, and Cristina watches as Izzie's heart dies, and then she falls still, and suddenly her flesh begins to decompose and she's screaming-_

Cristina only wakes up when she feels Meredith shaking her shoulders. It's only then that she realizes she's been screaming out loud.

"I can't forget her face," Cristina says. Her throat's tight and she can't breathe because she can still _see_ Izzie dying and she can't, she doesn't, she doesn't know how she's supposed to just move on from that. "I can't forget having to just _stand_ there and watch her _die_ just because some stupid piece of paper told me that I wasn't allowed to save her life!"

Meredith just holds her, and that's how they fall asleep again, until Derek finds them in the morning.

\\\\-||-/

Alex goes missing one night. Meredith finds him in a bar.

"You can't keep doing this," is all she says to him.

"I know," is all he says to her.

She feels like it's best to just leave him be, for now, and it seems to be okay. Every night she lets him drink himself into oblivion, and then she goes and picks him up, and he cries, and she cries, and the next morning they don't say anything about it.

This is okay, this is forgivable, until he starts bringing girls home from the bar. Meredith is almost run over by some skimpy blonde girl who runs out the door from Alex's room. "What are you doing?" she asks him as he walks out, shirtless.

"I'm doing her, clearly," he says, and suddenly it's as if she doesn't know him at all. But she does, she does know him, and she knows just what he's doing.

"Alex," she says, but she doesn't get to finish.

"She was the love of my life," he yells, all of his anger at the surface and whipping out at her. "She was the love of my life and she died in my arms! I can't go on living after that! There's no way to go on after that!"

"But there is," she whispers. "And this isn't it."

"You have your McDreamy," he says, just as softly as her. He's defeated, and it's not something that she ever wanted to have to see. "You have him, and you have your Post-It, so you don't know. You can't know."

He turns around to walk back into his room. "I hope you never know," he whispers under his breath, quiet enough so that he thinks she doesn't hear, but she does hear. She does, and she understands.

\\\\-||-/

"You can't _do_ this anymore!" Cristina yells, resisting the urge to slap Alex in the face, as if maybe that will slap some sense into him."Do you think Izzie would want you to waste your life away?"

"And who says that you know what Izzie would want?" Alex roars back.

"Well clearly, I know just a little better than you!"

Meredith wants nothing more than to get out of the room, but two of her three favourite people are in here and she doesn't know where else she can be.

"You don't know! You don't know how I'm feeling!"

"But I do! Izzie was my friend too, I was her maid of honour, I can't sleep anymore, I _know!"_

"And I was her _husband!"_

"Stop!" When Meredith yells this, they somehow both do, and for a moment she doesn't know what else she's supposed to say, but somehow she finds the words. "I don't know what Izzie would have wanted, but I know what I want, and I _need_ both of you to be you!"

They don't say anything, so she takes it as an invitation to continue. "Cristina, you can't sleep anymore. I can't count the number of times you've woken up screaming when you finally do. You need help, therapy, something, _please_. And Alex…Alex, you're my brother, and I can't stand to see you like this anymore!"

They just sit in silence after that, but that's okay. They all understand.

\\\\-||-/

Alex comes back to work the next day. Cristina gets an appointment, gets some pills, and sleeps for 8 hours the next night.

It's not right, it's not perfect, but it has the potential to be, and that's all Meredith can hope for.


End file.
